


A universe in you

by mkhhhx



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Age Difference, Animal Death, Blood and Injury, Fluff, Immortality, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Minor Character Death, Nature Magic, Reincarnation, Violence, discussions of death and mortality, fox spirit!Renjun, more bittersweet than angsty, the universe - Freeform, wolf shapeshifter!Jaemin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-10
Updated: 2020-12-10
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:00:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27994149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mkhhhx/pseuds/mkhhhx
Summary: "Taking down something so much bigger than you," Renjun had growled out quietly, knowing the mess of blood and dark fur wouldn't be able to hear him. "It's a blasphemy to the Universe, to not know your rightful place in it."
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Na Jaemin
Comments: 18
Kudos: 99





	A universe in you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [laehys](https://archiveofourown.org/users/laehys/gifts).



> Hello everyone!
> 
> The fic strays a little from my usual works, but I really enjoyed writing!   
> Please be mindful of the tags. The violence isn't extremely graphic, but better be safe with it.  
> It's also unbetaed, but I very much hope that after rounds of proofing it's more than decent. 
> 
> This is also a gift to my dear brainstorming buddy, Lua, who gave me the [prompt pics](https://twitter.com/pinkhrj/status/1333836042051457024/retweets/with_comments) which eventually became this fic. The final product is a bit different from the original idea, but I hope you still enjoy lots!

During long winters, even in the middle of the day, the forest is dark. Little light manages to creep in between the thick canopies of the trees and those few and sacred rays do nothing to warm the forest floor up. It's cold, frozen and damp, hostile to any outsiders, but Renjun has made his home there. 

Renjun was born along with the Universe and has lived for as long as the stars have been hanging from the sky. He wasn't always like this; a fox-like creature. At first he was nothing, just an idea, a tiny spirit floating from place to place, watching the continents settle and all kinds of life forms coming into existence. And then, he too became something, not more or less significant, but something new and something else. 

Renjun likes his corporeal form, his dainty legs and his sharp nails and even sharper teeth. He likes his fur too, warm around him, turning oh so pretty at spring and wonderfully fluffing up at winter even if it becomes a duller color. When he turns so old that he struggles to clearly recall the creation anymore, when he sees the bursting stars in dreams he doesn't remember the next morning the Universe graces him once again; this time with a human form. And he likes this one too, the slim body, the pretty blue veins traveling from his wrists up his arms, the soft hair falling on his face. 

The nymphs play with him around the forest. They tell him he's pretty in every form, a blessing from the Universe on the land of mortals. A blessing the forest enjoys and only few people have ever caught glimpses of through the centuries. He likes humans, he likes listening to them talk and laugh and sing, he likes watching them work, he likes all human things, fascinated a little too much by them, maybe. He knows of spirits who bond with humans, live in their homes and keep them company, make themselves known. But he is also aware of how cruel humans can be, how they wouldn't hesitate to cage him up, or even worse, try to kill his corporeal form. And he loves himself way too much to risk a fate like this.

Jaemin though, he isn't human. He isn't a spirit or an animal either and he's not the first of his kind Renjun meets roaming the world, can guess he won't be the last either. Renjun has companions at every corner of the forest; the whispering ancient rocks and the rivers, the fairies living between the flowers and the spirits of the lakes. The trees and the birds who sing in the early mornings, the animals who hunt late at night. He knows each and every one by name, greets them when he visits the lake at noon and bids them goodnight before he sets off to hunt in the evenings. He knows them when they are alive and knows them when they cease to exist in the mortal world and return to the Universe as spirits too, some to join him, others to become stars at faraway galaxies or specs of dust on mountaintops or grains of sand in the infinite oceans.

It's a winter day when he meets Jaemin. When he finds him, to be exact. The world is frozen, painted in hues of clear white and greys and light blues. Even Renjun, clad in his thick winter coat, had found himself freezing before he set off for his night hunt. Food was sparse in the coldest months, the mice either hiding or dying out from the cold or already caught by the masterful owls. Renjun could return to his purest form if he wanted to, the one that didn't require any kind of earthy nurishment, but he knew turning back again would be difficult. He'd done it only once; turning to a fox, when he first settled into the forest and he didn't want to lose that kind of life, to set himself for years or centuries of roaming the earth aimlessly again, away from the little tree hollow he called home and all the creatures and spirits he called friends and neighbors.

So that night, like every night before and every night that would follow, he set foot out to hunt, his slim form merging with the rotting leaves and the ice on the forest floor. It was quiet deep into the night, his ears perking up to every little sound as he searched for his next potential meal. He could hear the owls setting off, their wings as they opened before they'd noiselessly disappear into the night, he could hear the low chatter of the bare trees, their tired whispers, weakened by the cold. Rare were the humans in winter. Once, could be centuries ago, a human fell into the lake and died from the cold right upon clawing his way out. Another time, another human died too, slipping into the snow, breaking his bones, eaten by the crows and the bears before he could even drift to full unconsciousness. Humans are known to learn from their ancestor's mistakes and thus, they stray from the forest when the tree tops and lands are covered with snow, opting for the warmth and glow of the fires burning inside their homes. Renjun had experienced the warmth of a fire only a few times, but he did understand, because few feelings were better than curling next to it on a cold night.

In his hunt, hungry and dissapointed and cold, he had suddenly smelt blood, the rich, fresh scent he could almost taste on his tongue. After picking the scent a few droplets followed, frosting over the slippery ice. Maybe a deer if he was lucky, an unsteady sickly fawn falling prey to some bigger animal, or to nature itself. Renjun wasn't the best hunter in the forest, far from it actually, and he would do just fine with the leftovers of someone else's meal. The few scattered droplets turned thicker until they turned into a trail, a brief one actually, and at the end of it he found way more than he bargained for.

As he was expecting, there was a deer, a majestic, wonderful deer, bigger than any Renjun had seen before, thrown on its side, legs weak but still kicking as he was slowly meeting its demise, bleeding out from a bite mark on its throat, skin ripped and tendons hanging from bone to create a grotesque image. It wasn't the only soul set to its demise that night.

"Taking down something so much bigger than you," Renjun had growled out quietly, knowing the mess of blood and dark fur wouldn't be able to hear him. "It's a blasphemy to the Universe, to not know your rightful place in it."

The wolf had growled back at him, dark eyes on Renjun's smaller form, watching him watching the scene. The deer, the beautiful deer that should have been graced with one more day on this frozen land, bleeding its last breath out. And the wolf, struck by the deer's antlers, would accompany it to the other side, not getting a taste of his own hunt. That's what fate seemingly had decided for them. But it was also fate who had decided that Renjun arrived at the scene right then. Right when the deer huffed its last breath and the wolf's chest was heaving with a few more inhales and exhales to spare.

The wolf stared at him. A beast so pretty, so regal bleeding out at Renjun's feet. And Renjun might be an ancient spirit, one that has seen and lived through so much but at that moment he was nothing more but a mere, tiny fox, hungry and freezing. A tiny fox with a decision to make. He could ignore the wolf, let him become prey, a treat for the crows to find the next morning, a gift for the worms and the earth to reclaim. He could eat his share of the deer, sate his aching stomach and leave back to the warmth of his hollow, but he knew better. He knew he'd have to live through the next decades with those pitch black eyes following him. Renjun was an old soul, but not one hardened by time. If anything, he was getting kinder as the centuries passed, what he did that very night a proof of it.

To hear a full grown wolf cry out in pain, it was degrading for the beast. The wolf kept snivelling, whining and pawning as Renjun bit the deer's head to drive its antlers away, leaving the wolf with wounds open and bleeding. It was degrading for Renjun too, to sit there, tending to the whimpering beast, licking his wounds until the blood ceased, spit freezing along with the whines dying down.

"If you make it through the night, you might live," he had told the wolf, walking over to the deer carcass to get his share, the wolf staring, obviously in pain, obviously scared but Renjun couldn't do anything else for him, couldn't wake up the faes in the middle of the night and ask for remedies. But if the wolf lived, Renjun had decided, he would do that the following morning. For the rest of the night though, he ripped tender meat and muscle with his canines and threw it in front of the wolf's muzzle, letting him eat piece by piece.

Renjun was a kind spirit. The wolf lived through the night. He lived through the following day too and the whole week afterwards. The very following morning the crows came to claim what was left of the deer as the wolf was burning in fever. Renjun left him for a few precious hours to seek the wisest of the forest inhibuitants, begging for a remedy he knew he'd have to pay the full price of sooner or later. He kept the wolf alive through the night and he wouldn't lose him now. He carried the herbs, foul smelling and tasting, into his mouth back to the opening, the deer nothing but a pile of bones and the wolf curled into himself. 

Renjun tended to his wounds, stayed next to him until the fever went down, brought him mice to eat until his eyes started gleaming again, despite the matted, awful mess of his fur and the ugly healing wounds on his chest. A week of Renjun staying next to him until the wolf could stand on his own feet and walk without falling over and whimpering in pain. A week and a half from their first meeting until he leaned into Renjun's space, pressed his head on the side of Renjun's neck and growled.

"Thank you, I will repay your kindness," he had said. "Do not forget me, I am Jaemin."

And the wolf turned around and walked into the thick woods, Renjun half-expecting to never see him again, his kindness only for himself and the Universe to know.

  
  


"You shouldn't associate yourself with lowly creatures," an Oak tells him in passing at spring, the snow melting and the rivers coming down from the mountaintops overflowing.

"Lowly creatures?" Renjun asks, turning to the Oak, looking up at the heavy branches. He doesn't receive an answer though, because trees never share much with others than their own kind.

It's with those first rays of spring he sees Jaemin again, the black eyes he didn't forget, couldn't even if he tried too. They were tired and downcast when they parted, Jaemin's fur dirty with mud and blood and his tail hanging low between his hind legs, in embarrassment of his state maybe.

The wolf waiting right by Renjun's hollow on that cold spring morning looks nothing like it; his eyes are full of life, looking up at Renjun as he draws closer, his black fur is shining pretty as the midnight sky, his long tail is wrapped up around his legs delicately.

"Renjun," he growls. "I knew this was your nest, I could smell it."

His voice is deep, gravelly, like any wolf's, but somewhat playful too. Renjun hasn't talked with enough wolves to know if it's the norm, has only heard parts of their conversations in passing as their packs would hunt or howl to the full moon.

"Jaemin," Renjun looks at him in disbelief. "I didn't expect to see you again." He decides to be honest, taking the time to study the wolf. He's thin, not bony maybe, but slim, his fur short, only a little longer where it curls around the base of his ears. His canines peek out of his mouth, snow-white and sharp, his paws big and his nails so long they could tear Renjun apart in seconds. His fur thins on his chest where Renjun can't see, but knows, that four marks of patched skin reside. It somehow makes Jaemin look even prettier.

"I did tell you I'd repay your kindness, didn't I?" Jaemin nods at the hare a couple feet away. Renjun was picking up Jaemin's scent that was so strong he hadn't noticed it. "Sharing meals is the least I can do for you."

They spend the spring together, sharing way more than meals. Jaemin doesn't know his way around the forest as well as Renjun, but he is a great hunter. They seek food together, straying away from deer; making sure to follow the earth's rules, to leave meat on the bones for the crows, to gift what they cannot eat to the worms and beetles, doing their little part for the Universe to keep going infinitely.

Jaemin likes to talk and he likes playing around too. He doesn't appear every day. Sometimes it'll be once a week, other times way sooner or later. Renjun learns to pick up his scent from afar on the days he pays a visit, always seeking Renjun in front of the hollow.

Renjun enjoys watching him. The way he runs when he hunts all firm muscle, the way he growls and tears flesh apart, the way his tongue flicks out of his mouth to taste the first droplets of warm blood. He is pretty, maybe prettier than many beings Renjun has seen in his lifetime. Sometimes, when the sun hits his eyes just right, when he sprawls on the forest floor belly up, all playful, Renjun thinks he's even prettier than the nymphs and the fairies who can make a human go crazy with a single look.

"A creature like him," the rivers mutter when he sips from the springs hidden deep in caves by the foot of the mountain. "A creature like him with someone like you."

Renjun doesn't ask, because he knows it will go unanswered. He pays his debt to the fairies in full, luring hunters to their traps with the fluff of his tail, watches as the fairies slit their throats before consuming them. The days gradually turn bigger, the sun getting warmer every morning and he finds himself waiting for the next time Jaemin will appear in front of his nest to spend the day together.

When the clearings overflow with green and the plains turn to meadows of blooming flowers Renjun finds himself by Jaemin's side almost day after day. The earth breathes and the creatures hiding from the harsh winter start to wake up. Jaemin brings him the greatest of gifts for his nest; colorful wings from birds animals like them wouldn't be able to reach but Jaemin somehow catches anyway, a shed of snake skin to place at the crown of his hollow between leaves and dirt and soon enough, the hollow smells like Jaemin too even when he is not there.

Renjun was born as a solitary soul, having neither siblings nor close friends, but Jaemin soon creeps his way into his life. They spend the whole of spring like this, somewhat tied to each other, rolling on the damp grass as they play fight under the watchful gazes of the trees and the judgment of the earth underneath them. They swim in the hot springs chasing the salamanders resting on the cave walls and they hunt for fish side by side with the bears and their cubs. They greet each other as close friends too: Jaemin rubs his snoot by Renjun's neck to leave his musky scent there and Renjun bites him softly on the nape, Jaemin acting like he's hurt despite being four times Renjun's size.

They nap together under the sun next to the lake where it's warm and safe, curled next to each other with their tails intertwined and Renjun knows he's never felt anything like this for any other being, mortal or not, under the sun. He considers it a blessing, to be able to feel this in his ever-stretching lifetime, the warmth of a body next to his own, the growly laughs that shake Jaemin's chest when Renjun attacks him with little nips, the very specific feeling, the one he doesn't have a name of, the kind of safety and pride he feels deep in his bones when he wakes up in the middle of the night and his hollow smells like Jaemin and he, himself, smells like Jaemin too.

"I don't understand," he asks the oldest Oak of the whole forest. "What is the problem."

"Oh, Renjun," the Oak laughs and the earth trembles. "You've lost your mind, child."

"You cannot smell him, Renjun?" The Platanus chimes in. "Are you so blinded by love, you little spirit?"

Renjun looks up at them, at their branches heavy with fresh leaves, at the squirrels and birds, the insects; all watching him in interest.

This time he is the one who doesn't answer. Heading his way to the lake, ignoring the trees and the rocks and the butterflies and their eyes and their ears on him.

Because of course, of course he can smell Jaemin. He can smell the wolf on him. He can smell the burning wood and the town and humans on him too. The old spirits, the animals, the earth, they are all one, all binded to each other. Humans though, they are something else. Once they belonged to the earth too, along with all other creatures, kind and warm. Not anymore, not since they started burning the forests down and hunting for more than to feed themselves. Renjun doesn't question it, but he knows by scent alone; Jaemin does not belong to either one or the other.

Summer comes with cool nights, warm mornings and scorching noons. The depths of the forest remain green and lively, but the once colorful meadows and stretches of land turn into seas of warm yellows. The rivers quiet down, enjoying the warmth of the sun as all creatures and spirits do, the warm soil giving birth to all kinds of new forms of life.

Jaemin comes and goes. He has put on a bit more weight on his frame and it looks healthy. He's not especially big as far as wolves go, but there's something to him, the way he moves, the way his growls and yips and barks echo at open spaces and between trees and in the caves they visit, there's something special to him. Or maybe there isn't, maybe there's nothing special to him other than the bond he is building with Renjun.

"You don't have a pack," Renjun muses. They are by the lake, watching the herons fish.

"I do not," Jaemin confirms, body pressed close to Renjun's. "Never had one and probably never will."

"Doesn't it get lonely?" Renjun asks.  _ What do you do when we are apart? _

"It used to," Jaemin looks at him, eyes dark and murky and it still feels like they can see right through Renjun's soul. "Not anymore, not since I met you."

Renjun lets out a hum, one of his high-pitched fox noises, in acknowledgement before he turns to watch the still waters and the life around them.

"Let me show you something," Jaemin says, growl low, almost shy.

And when Renjun turns his head around again there's a boy sitting right next to him. He isn't startled because the boy still smells like Jaemin. A little more human than wolf, but Jaemin all the same and the sun falls on his short jet black hair in just the right way. He has the same eyes and a slim frame, all prodding bones and sharp lines. He's naked but doesn't try to hide himself as a human would, looking back at Renjun, waiting for the reaction that takes a while.

"You're pretty," Renjun settles, eyes trailing the lines of Jaemin's face. He's lived so long and has never kissed anyone, has never felt the need to, before.

"The last of my bloodline," Jaemin smiles. His human voice resembles his familiar low growl so much, so much that Renjun doesn't know how to handle the weird feeling settling deep down his stomach.

"Bloodline?" Renjun watches Jaemin's hands, relaxed in his lap. They are unlike his own soft ones, callused and veiny instead.

"Shapeshifters," Jaemin says. A word that explains so much, whether Jaemin knows it or not. And on one hand everything falls into place. On the other, nothing really changes.

Renjun decides that the only fair give and take is to eventually show himself to Jaemin too. He doesn't know if he's pretty as a human, but judging from the way Jaemin eyes him like a starving man, he supposes he must be. He's a little unsteady on his feet, changing to his human form after so long, years, decades even, but Jaemin is there to hold him, seemingly way more accustomed to walking on two feet.

The forest judges them, judges Renjun for choosing to stay by Jaemin's side. An impure creature stuck between two worlds, a dirty mortal human sneaking his way to the world of all the pure creatures gracing the earth. But the Universe showed Jaemin to Renjun and the Universe does not hold grudges, the Universe loves all her children the same, is what he likes to think.

"You have infinite time," Jaemin tells him after their first kiss against the old Oak, bare human bodies flush on each other, lips not quite knowing what they are doing, but enjoying it all the same. "And yet the Universe blessed me with a fraction of it."

"I wish I could give you more," Renjun rests his head at the crook of Jaemin's neck, bites the soft skin in the way he so often does, now sharp teeth replaced by blunt ones and Jaemin makes a sound at the back of his throat, a sound that makes Renjun want more than he ever thought he could get. "I wish I could break infinity in half and spend the rest of it with you."

"Falling in love," the moss chuckles. "The most human flaw of them all, fallen upon a spirit." But Renjun has long learnt to ignore what the forest says.

If Renjun enjoyed watching wolf Jaemin once, he enjoys human Jaemin tenfold. He's all lean muscle, soft sunkissed skin from the time he spends bare around the forest. His lips are soft, his eyelashes cast the prettiest of shadows on his cheeks and he's unlike any human Renjun has ever seen before. He knows how to use his hands, oh he so knows. He touches Renjun shamelessly in all the places Renjun hadn't even thought about being touched before. He litters kisses on Renjun's shoulders, the dips of his collarbones, his back. He gets on his knees, down on the damp soil and makes Renjun think that mortality would even be worth this, whatever it is that Jaemin does to him with his sinful mouth and tongue.

And by the end of the summer when everything is almost unbearably warm, at evenings they find themselves with sweat rolling off their skin as the sun goes down, even after they've just finished swimming with droplets still on their hair. Those evenings they end up in meadows watching the stars flickering on the sky, listening to the moon’s singing as they bask in the afterglow of their love making.

"This moment," Jaemin smiles at him, hair falling into his eyes and his hand keeping Renjun close. "This moment is our infinity."

Renjun has lived the creation of the Universe. Has seen galaxies exploding into bursts of colour and stars being born. Has seen forests and lush jungles and mountaintops and oceans. He has never wanted to freeze time and keep a moment intact before; not until Jaemin looks at him and his eyes reflect all the stars above them, the whole Universe.

Renjun loves autumn. The rain makes the earth dance and the rays of the sun don't burn anymore. The rivers start flowing again, the animals enjoying that final stretch of flourish before the world turns cold. His autumn coat looks good against the fallen leaves, is what Jaemin tells him. His brown hair looks good too, Jaemin mutters as they kiss, lazily as ever at the edge of the lake. The forest has long stopped its whispers and mutters, has decided Renjun is a lost cause.

Jaemin brings him hares and partridges and small deer. He accepts mice and sparrows and fish from Renjun too. The hollow doesn't fit the two of them, so they move to one of the caves with the hot springs, always damp, but warm when they lay against each other, when Renjun climbs on top of Jaemin's frame and curls on his back feeling how his chest heaves as they drift off to sleep together. And by the end of autumn, when the world becomes a giant glass snow globe and the cold leaves them hungry every other day, Jaemin asks him to come back to his human home with him.

They sneak to the town in the middle of the night, too few people to notice them at the streets and the couple that do not sparing a second glance, thinking the two figures roaming the streets are nothing more than stray dogs searching for food.

They stop in front of the door and Jaemin turns into his human form, picking a key from under a pot and unlocking it, taking Renjun into his arms as they step inside. "It's not much," he says, Renjun looking around in awe. It's not the first time he's into a human home, but this one, it smells like wood and a little like dust. It smells a lot like Jaemin himself. "Do you want to turn?" Jaemin asks, caressing the soft fur between Renjun's ears before he leaves him on the carpeted floor. "I'll bring you clothes."

And so they spend the winter like this; a winter unlike any Renjun has spent before. A wolf and a fox, curled around each other in front of the fireplace with a snowstorm raging outside. Human Jaemin gets Renjun drunk on wine and kisses him unlike they've ever kissed before. Human Renjun buries himself in Jaemin's clothes, warm and comfortable when they cuddle on the couch and when they fall together on the bed.

Some nights they sneak out, run to the forest to spend a day or two, hunt, play in the snow, visit the springs and Renjun's hollow just to make sure that all of Jaemin's presents are still there. Some days they walk by the market and visit the shops, as the humans do. Jaemin buys him books and teaches him how to read, lets him choose his own clothes, although Renjun keeps wearing Jaemin's more often than not.

"What will you do, Renjun?" A fairy asks him. "What will you do when he is old and grey? Will you hold him on his deathbed knowing you'll never have him back?"

"Foolish Renjun," a second fairy says, less sympathetic and Renjun only feels pity. If they'd ever have the chance to experience that kind of love, the way Jaemin loves him, they'd know the answers already. They'd know that Renjun, if he could, he would turn the whole Universe upside down to have Jaemin forever by his side. They'd know that since he cannot do that, he has promised himself to be there until the very end.

"When I die, do not be sad," Jaemin tells him. They are warm and comfortable under the covers, holding each other like they could drift apart in the middle of the night. "When I die, keep searching for me Renjun. I promise you will find me again."

The Universe was kind to them. The Universe made sure they'd meet, they'd fit into each other's lives just right, Renjun thinks, tracing the marks, gray and deep on Jaemin's chest. Jaemin won't live forever, but there's something of him, what some call the soul, the little part in him that belongs to the earth that will be returned, reused, that will live on. When the time comes Renjun knows what he will do. He'll travel. Travel all over the world. He'll see the cities and the seas and all kinds of views and creatures. He will know when he finds him again. Maybe the prettiest shell on a never-ending beach. Maybe a wild flower peeking from the snow. Maybe a bird singing in the early mornings. Renjun spent infinity without a purpose. He can spend the rest of it looking for Jaemin.

"We have time," Renjun says, instead of any other thoughts in his mind. "We have all the time in the world right now."

"Tell me a story, then," Jaemin asks, cupping his face, pressing a soft kiss at the corner of his mouth. "Tell me your favorite story."

And Renjun tells him about bursting stars and roaming spirits. About the creatures that wandered once on earth and the first flower that ever bloomed. About people and animals and rivers and trees who once were his friends, but their names are long forgotten. He tells Jaemin about the stars and the Universe and the deepest oceans he saw when he still didn't have a body. He tells him about the first time he was given his fox form and then the human one too. 

He even tells him the greatest stories of them all; about the night he found an injured wolf deep into the woods. About the boy he fell in love with along with the last blooming flowers of spring and the first warm summer sunshines.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!  
> Come talk to me [here](https://twitter.com/kuns_dimples)!


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